


Patience

by vilecrocodile



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Complete, F/F, Past Relationship(s), Slow Burn, discussion of Talon benefit plans, some background Reaper/Doomfist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-16
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-01-18 08:07:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 18,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12384252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vilecrocodile/pseuds/vilecrocodile
Summary: The thing about Widowmaker is not so much that she is ruthless or emotionless, but that she is patient. But Sombra's patient, too. Just in a different, noisier way.Slow burn. Sombra and Widowmaker, from coworkers to lovers to coworkers again, and then to something else entirely.





	1. Chapter 1

When agitated, Sombra strings together security systems for blank files and then breaks them open again. It's mindless, pointless work that keeps her hands busy and her mind free to wander. She's doing it now, hitting keys a little harder than she needs to and making the normally whisper-soft keyboard click and clack with her typing.

“I'm just saying, she missed.”

Reaper's stance is as impassive as his mask, and the inclining of his head barely noticeable out of the corner of her eye.

“She did indeed.”

Clickclackclickclack, go the keys.

“You know what I'm talking about, hombre, I mean, it wasn't even a difficult shot. Not that it'd matter if it had been difficult. She's Widowmaker, right? The point of her is, like, she doesn't miss.”

Clickclickclickclack.

“Something tells me it's not her skills that are slipping, you know? Something's distracting her, you know?” She's talking too fast and repeating herself too much, and she knows it. Her typing intensifies. “She and Tracer had that thing, and now they don't, you know? And it's bothering her. I don't know if she's sad about it, or mad, or she's just like, going crazy without sex, but it's affecting her, like, emotions.”

Reaper snorts. “Widowmaker isn't meant to have any emotions. That is 'the point of her.'”

“Everyone's got emotions. It's just, like, how much you let yourself feel them.”

“Perhaps she's due for reconditioning.”

The clacking halts sharply as Sombra turns and stares at the faint outline of Reaper's jaw in the shadow of his hood, as though she can discern his thoughts from its curve. Over the years Sombra had become adept at reading the subtle moods of her stoic teammates, out of self-preservation if nothing else. Satisfied that his comment had been mostly in jest, she returns to her keyboard.

“That's a bit, like, overkill, you know? Talon sure knows how to make people kill people, but it's like, they don't know how to treat a _woman_ , you know?”

“You are concerned about her performance,” Reaper summarizes dryly. “You believe emotional distress is making her less effective in the field.”

_Get to the point_ , is what goes unsaid. Sombra’s face flushes hot. Reaper – Gabriel – is more than twice her age and, confident in his respect of her skills, it’s easy to play the obnoxious child around him. Sometimes, though, she feels truly young and ridiculous under his weighty silences and deadpan jokes.

“It's practical to be concerned about a teammate's performance and well-being,” he prompts her, expectantly. “A weak link can doom us all.”

Clearly, Sombra didn't bring this up as idle gossip; she keeps gossip close to her chest and doles it out strategically. Reaper has already guessed that she's bringing this up to him because she has a plan, and the plan requires his cooperation, if not his help. Sombra sighs and stops typing, steeling herself for what she has to say next.

“I'm saying, I mean, I think I should have sex with her, yknow?” she says it quickly and finishes with a shrug, trying to rip off the embarrassment like a band-aid.

There is a longer silence now, and Sombra is positive Reaper is laughing at her under his mask. She feels her blush creep up to the top of her ears as he presumably collects himself and says, “If you think that will help.”

Now that the moment of embarrassment is over, she spins the chair around with a grin. “Well, I'm not a bad-looking woman. It's an old fashioned remedy for heartbreak, or whatever it is she's feeling. Wild, spur-of-the-moment, no-strings-attached sex. Which requires some careful planning to pull off. That's where you come in.”

To her mild amazement, Gabriel seems to be giving the matter serious thought. She was expecting to have to do more entrapment and blackmail than this.

“Do you think....that...will be enough to spare her from reconditioning?”

“Oh? You think I just want an excuse to have sex with her?”

“That would be more like you.”

“Don't pretend to guess my motivations, big man,” Sombra chides, spinning back around and adding some meaningless key-clicking for effect. “Let's just say that, one way or another, I'm doing her for the team.”

“I don't see why I have to be involved in this,” Reaper grumbles.

“I'm explaining you!” the other snaps, dropping an article in her irritation. She pauses, and then says more calmly, “All I need is for you to arrange for us to be sent out on a mission together. Make it somewhere remote. Easy mark. And romantic, you hear?”

Reaper grunts and it sounds affirming enough. When she looks up again, he is gone.

  
  



	2. Chapter 2

The thing about Reaper is that he is reliable, which is only a step away from being predictable. Talon has seen it fit to send Sombra and Widowmaker on a sojourn to somewhere on the shitty outskirts of Cairo; they're taking out some wealthy expat who has been doing something or other with money or information; Sombra only skimmed the briefing. She has bigger bugs to fry.

Day one had been jetlag, and recon. The day's over now, the intel gathered, but Widowmaker still stands by the window of the rented room, carefully positioned to be out of sight of anyone who might casually glance up. She watches the ground and the rooftops; Sombra, pretending to tap at screens, watches her.

She is so still she doesn't even seem to be breathing, though Sombra could read her vitals anytime she wishes; with a gesture she could have the data on her teammate's impossibly shallow breaths and impossibly slow heartbeat chattered into her ear. She wonders idly if Widowmaker's low body temperature keeps her cool in the Egyptian heat. She wonders if her skin would be cold to the touch or hot, like metal warmed by the sun.

Sombra dismisses her screens with a flick, and then stretches her arms out and rolls her neck in a theatrical motion, accompanying it with a long sigh. “Well, I'm about ready to call it a night. How about you, _vidua_?”

Widowmaker looks up briefly in the fading light, and says, “Sleep, if you wish. I will keep watch.”

“Keep watch for what? Mosquitos?” Sombra lies back and folds her arms behind her head, momentarily amusing herself with the thought of Widowmaker sniping tiny bugs out of the air. “This guy's security is a joke. He's got nothing to spring on us.”

Widowmaker says nothing, and Sombra assumes she's making a point of ignoring her. The thing about Widowmaker is not so much that she is ruthless or emotionless, but that she is patient. Willing to crouch in the same position for hours upon hours, waiting for a target to appear. Willing to let an associate needle her relentlessly, and not give her an inch. But Sombra's patient, too. Just in a different, noisier way.

“You work too hard. It's not good for you,” Sombra closes her eyes, the very picture of confident carelessness. “You ought to relax more.”

“...”

If she arches her back and stretches her leg out as far as she can, she can just about prod Widowmaker with the tip of her big toe. It's a very small hotel room: They're staying under the radar. There's only one bed. There always is, in these cheap places.

“Hey,” It takes three or four sharp prods before she can irritate Widowmaker into turning around. Before the other can snap at her to stop it, Sombra cuts in, “Come over here. Hang out with me.”

Widowmaker opens her mouth, shuts it again, glances back out the window. Sombra can see her wavering, and adds, “I'll only keep doing it.”

The other sighs and relents; she leans her rifle against the wall, still within arm's reach in the tiny room, and sits down on the bed beside Sombra. Perhaps a little closer than is strictly necessary: her thigh is nearly brushing against Sombra's ribs, but she sits stiffly, poised, staring straight ahead with her hands folded neatly in her lap. Sombra closes her eyes again and doesn't move a muscle. She's almost in danger of relaxing for real before Widowmaker finally says, “Well?”

Sombra opens one eye. “Well, what?”

“What are we doing?”

“Uh, hanging out? Relaxing? At least, I'm relaxing. You could be putting in more effort.”

Widowmaker leans on one arm and frowns down at her, and Sombra opens both eyes to look up at that hard face. She keeps her own completely open and innocent, though can't help the corner of her mouth twitching as Widowmaker's brow furrows, trying to ferret out what kind of trick is being played.

Then the sniper turns away, and with a huff, lies back abruptly on the bed, dropping her body like a stone. Sombra lets her grin spread unchecked. “There you go. That's the idea.”

Widowmaker scowls, crosses her arms across her chest, and closes her eyes. She might as well have folded them like a vampire in a coffin. Sombra props herself up on her elbow and stares at her like that for a long moment.

“Well?” says Widowmaker, not opening her eyes. “Are we relaxing?”

Sombra laughs, and then leans down and kisses her.

 

  
Just as Sombra had suspected, she is warm from the sun, but it is the kind of superficial heat that soon fades. Already she feels the chill rising from underneath. Widowmaker opens her eyes, for an instant full of blank confusion, and then they focus, and she says, almost smugly, “Ah. I see.”

“See what? We're just relaxing.”

“Just relaxing,” Widowmaker repeats slowly.

“We deserve it. We work hard.”

“And after this, I suppose, we will return to our work.”

“Of course.”

Widowmaker nods, apparently satisfied with the terms of the arrangement, and then reaches up to resume the kiss, opening her mouth against Sombra's, her cold arms closing around her back. Sombra hums in triumph and delight and shifts herself on top of Widowmaker, letting herself get lost in the new sensation.

She runs out of air before Widowmaker does, of course, and eventually has to pull away to take a few deep breaths, resting her forehead on the uncomfortable edge of the other's visor. Widowmaker's eyes flicker open, for a moment senseless again, and then they re-focus – it's unnerving how her gaze can snap to attention so suddenly, like a switch being flicked – and she gently pushes Sombra away from her.

Sombra sits patiently on her knees, wiggling a little in anticipation as she watches Widowmaker carefully remove her visor and put it aside, then begin to loosen the bulky contraption on her arm. It's as good as a striptease. Sombra sheds her own jacket without a thought, pulls away her jumpsuit until she's stripped down to just her undershirt and naked wires. The night air breezes through the open window and cools some of the sweat on her skin. When Widowmaker returns to her, looking somehow smaller and more human without her equipment, her touch is like ice. But Sombra ignores it, ignores the coursing of goosebumps across her skin as the cold hands cup her jaw, grasp her neck, press on the small of her back.

She busies her own hands with stripping Widowmaker's jumpsuit away from her ashy shoulders; Widowmaker is on top now, kissing and nipping at Sombra's neck, her chest, her breast, moving lower. Sombra sighs and lets herself melt into the cheap bedspread. How long had it been since she'd been laid, properly laid? Maybe this whole thing had been a selfish, horny, childish endeavor after all…

Lost in this consideration, she nearly jumps when Widowmaker’s tongue suddenly flicks between her legs, just the briefest touch, like a snake scenting the air. She hears the sniper chuckle lowly and then Widowmaker moves back up, her thick, heavy hair falling into Sombra’s face (when did she take the ponytail out?) as she kisses her again.

Widowmaker’s thigh is between Sombra’s legs, a hard muscle rhythmically flexing; Sombra writhes beneath her, groaning into her mouth, biting at her lip. After too short a time, the other woman pulls away, and Sombra meets those yellow eyes; they are intent, narrowed with concentration, as though lining up a crucial headshot. Sombra sighs in mock exasperation.

“What did I tell you about relaxing?” she chides, and scoots backwards into a sitting position, motioning for the other to follow. Widowmaker hesitates, but then obligingly crawls onto the bed, and Sombra pulls her close, kissing and nibbling her collarbone, moving her hand between her legs. She feels the sniper tense up as she slips a finger in, and then, gradually, relax into her.

“Good girl,” Sombra murmurs against Widowmaker's chest, flexing her finger and gently, experimentally, probing another. She’s removed her nails - they’re only hard-light constructs anyway, to better interact with her screens - but not the thin wires that produce them. Widowmaker moans and shudders; Sombra pushes her onto her back, her thumb rubbing her clit, the dark of night closing around them, and -

“Stop,” Widowmaker gasps, faintly at first, then stronger. “Stop.”

Sombra obediently halts, frowning concern into the shadows of the other's face. “What's wrong? A...a...are you o-”

It's only then Sombra realizes her own teeth are chattering; that she had been putting her tongue between them to halt it. She's shaking, almost violently, not with lust but with cold, and the faint buzzing in her ear had been her own vitals, repeating a warning about sub-optimal body temperature. Night had fallen in earnest, and the body beneath her is sucking away her heat.

Widowmaker pulls an untidy curtain of hair out of her eyes, her face serious behind it. “I am making you cold.”

Incredibly, the first thing that runs through Sombra's head is a wealth of stupid, flirty responses to that. She picks one of them. “Don't worry about it, babe. I'm hot enough for both of us.”

She's not sure if Widowmaker actually rolled her eyes, but she makes to sit up, and Sombra slides out of her and moves away. Sitting on the edge of the bed, the sniper begins to fix her hair, a process which apparently takes an eternity, and Sombra sits back on her heels, rocking with frustration. She could so easily reach out and insistently pull her back, but her arms are locked hard against her sides and refuse to move. She is still shivering. The spider tattoo on Widowmaker's back stares at her through its red hourglass eye, almost mockingly.

“It is late. You should sleep,” Widowmaker says. Her voice is perceptibly tense with the effort, Sombra can tell, of pretending not to care that their encounter was cut short. The hacker feels a flash of anger. What kind of stupid discipline test or self-effacing shit does this woman feel the need to put herself through? After she had worked so hard to get them here...

But her anger evaporates as she realizes sheepishly she is very cold, and tired, and after all they have a target to eliminate tomorrow, and, fuck it, she pulls the blanket around herself and plops down, feeling herself begin to defrost. Widowmaker comes and lies down beside her, naked, all graceful limbs and languid elegance, a stony, untouchable beauty. But Sombra feels sweaty-sexy and alive in her blanket cocoon.

Widowmaker reaches out and gently brushes Sombra's cheek, looking deep into her eyes, and says: “So tell me, _cherie_ , were you planning to put a bullet in my head during sex, or after?”

Taken aback, Sombra laughs aloud, and the spell is broken; she sits up, the blanket falling from her shoulders, and laughs until tears spring to her eyes. She gives Widowmaker her cheekiest wink and says, “Oh, god, after, of course. If I didn't actually fuck you, they'd consider the job half done, and would dock my pay.”

“Hmfft. Freelancers,” Widowmaker sniffs haughtily, but she grins, a wide grin, exposing teeth, and Sombra's heart leaps into her throat. She almost expected Widowmaker's teeth to be sharp, like some of the Los Muertos members who filed theirs into points. But they are square, normal, evenly spaced. They're very nice, actually. She makes a mental note to investigate her own eligibility for Talon's dental plan.

As Sombra watches, Widowmaker's grin fades a little, and her eyelids grow heavy. The hacker tilts her head, the moonlight catching and glinting off her VR contacts. “Was that a joke, _vidua_? I've never heard you make a joke.”

“‘Vidua?’”

“It means...“

But Widowmaker's face has gone impassive, and she only stares softly at Sombra without seeming to hear her. Her gaze is suddenly fuzzy, unfocused, like she's forgotten where she is; her eyes close, and she is, in all appearances, asleep. Sombra gazes incredulously at the relaxed face, the unguarded body, the harmlessness of her. Was this what her husband saw, the night before she killed him?

Sombra lies back down, too, but her mind and body are restless throughout the night. Finally, she gets up, and closes the window. It doesn't hurt to be a little cautious.


	3. Chapter 3

Day two, they eliminate the target. A quick, easy job. Days three to five are throwaway days, to divert suspicion and make sure loose ends are tied. Standard practice for a standard job. They have sex in the middle of the day, when the sun is beating down and Widowmaker's cool skin is a relief instead of a danger.

Sombra has always enjoyed cuddling – it takes the sting out of one-night stands, unless, of course, they were intended to sting. She becomes downright clingy in the thick, hot air, and Widowmaker doesn't seem to mind: languid and indulgent enough to lie still for hours, she watches the cracks in the ceiling with her usual quiet patience, perhaps replaying the moment of the kill over and over in her head. Sombra amuses herself by trying to time her breaths to the other woman's slow heartbeat, unaided by data from her sensors, until her ear gets cold and her fingers grow restless. Then she wakes Widowmaker from her trance-like thoughts to get another few rounds in before evening.

If she’s not too exhausted from the day, Sombra sits up at night and looks through her screens, wondering if Reaper had been at all aware of the temperature issue in sending them to a hotter clime. If so, he might have underscored the point with a quick email: _Dear Sombra, do not fuck her at night when it is cold, she will give you hypothermia, love your amigo Reaper._ Though perhaps not from the official server.

She also searches the Talon HR records for a way to make herself eligible for the dental program, which is really quite robust. To get the best benefits, however, you have to be considered the legal property of Talon, which Sombra isn't keen on. You also have to be classified as a “supersoldier”: Sombra is undoubtedly super, and she supposes any idiot who could fire a gun could be considered a “soldier”, but because her tech augments weren't done by Talon, she is labeled a “mercenary”. She doesn't really like that descriptor; it sounds thuggish, she prefers something more sleek and professional-sounding, like...“freelancer.”

She remembers Widowmaker's wide grin, the square neat teeth, and shivers and waits for the sun to rise.

 

The task is completed, the trip ends, and, as agreed upon, Sombra and Widowmaker go back to work without a murmur of discussion or complaint. On the next mission, Sombra keeps a careful eye on their sniper. One shot, one kill. One shot, one kill. One shot...Sombra finds herself holding her breath each time she spies Widowmaker lining up another one, exhaling only when the unlucky victim's brains are splattered on the wall. The shots become trickier, her lungs burn, but the bullets always find their mark. Widowmaker is back to being unaffected, confident, and, for her, in what passes for good humor. She isn't sent to reconditioning.

Sombra's almost a little disappointed. She wouldn't have minded an excuse to repeat the experience. But that's just boredom and lingering horniness: Sombra's always considered herself the kind of gal who likes to roam around, as the old song goes, and she knows the occasional spikes of sentimentality that come with the territory. She ignores them. Still, it wouldn't be terrible of Reaper to throw her a bone - another girls’ trip, another easy mark - once in awhile. But the man is completely dense.

“Well done,” he tells her. “It seems your...little plan worked just as you intended.”

“What did I tell you?” Sombra replies, enjoying his discomfort. “Talon doesn't know how to treat a woman. I do.” She pauses, and then waggles a finger. “But don't think this means I'm going to fuck the sad out of you too. I got my limits.”

Reaper chuckles throatily. “If sexual therapy is indeed so effective, perhaps I...”

He stops, suddenly, as though realizing what he is saying. Sombra nearly bursts with glee.

“Finish that sentence.”

“...”

“Finish that sentence, _cabron_! Come on, like I don't know already. Who is it, huh? Who's gonna fuck the sad out of you?”

“Sombra...” he growls threateningly, some black smoke pouring from behind his mask, but he's already lost face and he knows it.

“Old man Rein? Roadhog? You like 'em big, right? Could it be...” her lips curl with anticipation. “...oh, surely not...Mister Doomfist?”

At that, Reaper unleashes a deathly angry snarl and evaporates into his ghostly form, vanishing into the shadows of the server room. Sombra's laughter follows him, presumably, down the hall. As usual, she's the cat who got the canary. She's pretty pleased with herself.

It lasts about a week.


	4. Chapter 4

The first warning sign comes while she is pouring over her collection of information on Widowmaker.

By itself, this is nothing new. Sombra makes a habit of regularly reviewing and expanding her files on friends, enemies, and bystanders. The closer she works with - or against - someone, the more frequently she’ll check it. She thinks of them “files” because it brings to mind a quaintly antiquated image of a filing cabinet, filled with neatly labeled manilla folders, but in reality they are more like algorithms. They pull related information from every corner of her network at her whim: Nothing is stored in one place, everything is instantaneously updated.

She’s looking through Widowmaker’s file, which is a logical thing to do, seeing if anything new comes to light in the fresh context she has for her. There’s very little. The target they eliminated in Cairo was barely a footnote, and certainly hasn’t been connected to Talon yet. There hasn’t been a high-profile assassination in months, not since the omnic leader in London (Sombra had nearly drowned in the chatter about that). There’s some internal reports about a handful of smaller incidents related to Lena “Tracer” Oxton, and then the useful information stops. Talon’s kept Widowmaker on a short leash since then.

Sombra closes the algorithm and brings up another; the one programmed to search for Amélie Lacroix _née_ Guillard.

It’s even less likely there will be new information here, but Sombra didn’t become the world’s greatest hacker and information broker without being thorough. She scrolls through the extensive data surrounding Ana Amari’s supposed death and the emergence of the sniper who was not yet known as Widowmaker, reaching back through Gérard Lacroix’s autopsy report and failed search and rescue missions to the truly pre-Widowmaker, the woman who was Amélie.

Sombra favorite part of the file is the tabloids from before she became Lacroix: That’s where she first realized she might have a shot at her, so to speak. Amélie Guillard, a rising star in the world of professional dance, was openly bisexual and appears to have dated mostly women. There were no nobodies or lurkers in the shadows here: A sharp and elegant fellow ballerina (predictable); the chief editor of a fashion magazine, her hair a sophisticated silver (why would a woman as rich as Guillard need a sugar mommy?); a renowned photographer, boxy and nervous beside that tall drink of water.

Sombra comes to rest on this last one, examining the clunky pageboy hair and thick-framed glasses, and thinks, pityingly, that she looks very _nice_. But she supposed Amélie might have been a nice woman, herself.

The twinge in Sombra’s chest comes unexpectedly. Jealousy? Of this dowdy girl who would never see the woman she thought of as Amélie ever again, whereas Sombra worked beside a deadly sniper nearly every day? Maybe it’s the way the faded image of the ballerina in the tabloids looks at her, the easy smile, the gentleness, the warmth. But none of that is Widowmaker, is it? This woman in the tabloids and the one she slept with in Cairo might as well be completely different people. Technically speaking, they are.

Speaking of jealousy…

 

Word gets out, because word always does. Sombra traces the information leak to Reaper, who mentioned something offhand to McCree, who then, she assumes, made a wild speculation and told it to everyone he knew. Honestly, this is why she prefers working with women. Aside from the other, more obvious reason, of course.

They’re in Glasgow and have just been intercepted by the rag-tag team that’s still rather optimistically calling itself Overwatch. Sombra quickly falls back, as she always does, but this time there’s a cerulean blink, a flash, and Tracer is gunning for her. Sombra curses, and speeds down back alleyways, clambering over rooftops, trying to shake her, but the woman is persistent. They get further and further from the main fight, separating from the pack. Risky. Not just for Tracer, but for Sombra as well. She prefers not to go toe-to-toe with a single opponent, if she can help it. Not without some significant advantage in her corner.

She begins to circle back, wondering how Reaper is doing against the admittedly pathetic main bulk of Overwatch. Probably fine, especially if Widowmaker is covering him. If she can get back into range, then maybe Widowmaker can spot her on her visor if things start to go south…

No. Too late. Sombra skids to a halt as Tracer suddenly cuts her off, guns blazing. Sombra throws up an arm as a spray of bullets rips past her; one grazes her, but only barely. She knows Tracer isn’t exactly a sharpshooter, but, at this range, she’d have to _try_ to miss that badly. She’s clearly not shooting to kill. That’s…interesting. Sombra hesitates in raising her uzi, finger still tense on the trigger, and slowly lowers her arm. Tracer’s lowered her pistols and just stands there, breathing heavily, glowering at her, until the silence gets kind of uncomfortable. Sombra could easily vanish, but curiosity has her on a tether.

“Um,” she offers. “You know you can put more bullets in those, if you run o -”

“Shut up.”

The growly, short-talking, woman-of-few-words schtick doesn't really work for Tracer, but some massive reserve of anger seems to be carrying the act. Somba smiles at the other woman, doing a surreptitious check on the status of her translocators. A couple were in the red, but that wasn't unusual; they get stumbled across or stepped on all the time. She only needs one.

“If you have something to say, say it,” Sombra says. “I hang out with Skullface and Miss Spider, the silent intimidation act isn't going to work on me.”

“What do you think you're playing at?” Tracer snaps, her voice going up a few octaves as she abandons the growl. “With Amélie?”

“Same thing I'm always playing at, Oxton. A game.”

“I knew it,” says Tracer, as though Sombra has just given her some important information rather than a stupid quip; her face twists into a scowl, and then a sort of grim smirk. “Amélie is...she’s never going to love you, you know.”

“Oh?” Sombra raises an eyebrow. “Like she loved you, you mean?”

That gets her a satisfying flinch, and the hacker presses her advantage.

“Loved you enough to leave Talon for you? I notice she's still with us, chair-ee,” she mangles the French word on purpose. “I suppose, sometimes, a good benefits package outweighs true lo- ”

Tracer's been ticking like one of her pulse bombs, and now she explodes. “You don't even know her!” she snaps. “You don't even know who she is!”

That actually manages to ruffle Sombra. If nothing else, she prides herself on knowing things.

“Better than you do, I expect,” she mutters, dropping her cheery tone. “Did you know she hates to be called ‘Amélie’?”

It's mostly a lie – Widowmaker has never expressed a preference – but how would Tracer know? Sombra's the one who knows things. Lena “Tracer” Oxton doesn't know shit.

Except how to use a pistol. Sombra dives for cover as a bullet whizzes past her ear like an angry bee.

“What do you care? You've moved on!” she calls from behind the dumpster, readying her own gun. “Sweet Emily, isn't it?”

“Shut up!” Tracer roars, but she's cut off as the hacker blindly unloads her clip in her direction, and Sombra hears, rather than sees, the other woman dodge aside. The uzi clicks, she draws it back. Even as she begins to reload, Sombra decides she doesn’t have time for this back-alley spurned lover bullshit. She picks a location at random and lets the dissolving buzz begin to run up her spine. But Tracer is fast, too fast, popping up out of nowhere, a pulse bomb in her hand, a sticky explosive that will follow Sombra straight through her translocator. Sombra slams the fresh clip into her uzi, raises it, and Tracer's arm goes back like a pitcher's, ready to throw -

\- and the ground explodes at her feet with a deafening crack.

Widowmaker was in range, after all. Sombra glances up, just in time to catch the muzzle flash, as Tracer stumbles, catches herself, and leaps backwards through time, the pulse bomb fizzling out like it had never existed. A warning shot from Widowmaker was rare, and its message had been for Tracer, not Sombra. _Stay away._

Sombra has just enough time to waggle her fingers mockingly before the translocator does its work; the afterimage of Tracer’s furious eyes burns into her retinas as she re-emerges on a rooftop. She blinks it away, and then remembers to turn her comm back on. Reaper crackles angrily in her ear; the battle’s already over and a Talon chopper cuts up the sky for the evac. Sombra reaches for the proffered ladder and clambers up into the helicopter in a practiced motion. Her teammates are already there, looking despondent as ever.

“Hi, guys. Did we win?”

Reaper growls something in the negative, and then demands, “Where were you? We could have flanked them.”

“I had Doc Martin on my tail the whole time,” Sombra yells over the wind. “Ask Widow, she saw it.”

Widowmaker nods and taps her visor. “I was keeping an eye,” she says, humorless. “Do you always – how does Reaper call it...?”

“Spray 'n' pray,” their older teammate grunts.

“Hasn't failed me yet,” Sombra retorts, taking her seat. “And you're one to talk, big guy. At least I don’t toss away the baby with the bathwater.”

Reaper grumbles, and, incredibly, the corners of Widowmaker's mouth twitch in faint amusement. Sombra smiles at her, but the flicker of emotion has already vanished.


	5. Chapter 5

Overwatch may be a disorganized bunch of annoyingly scrappy rag-tag underdogs, but, to tell the truth, Talon isn’t much better. A heaving mish-mash of ex-military and nu-bureaucracy, it struggles under mismanagement, internal corruption, and unclear hierarchies; not to mention that their de facto leader is usually too busy with his personal demons to remember to file mission reports. Reaper’s a great boss, really. He never notices when a few thousand bitcoins go missing.

Talon is a mess, which generally suits Sombra’s needs just fine. But the minute Akande “Doomfist” Ogundimu set foot back into the headquarters, that all changed. Under Akande’s perhaps literal iron fist, Talon was transformed from a leaky pirate vessel to a tight ship in a shockingly short amount of time. Sombra was never big on authoritarians, which is why she’s surprised at how much she actually enjoys having the big guy around.

Working under a real leader is refreshing. Her paychecks are always on time, and deposited into the correct overseas account. On the field, Akande plows through Overwatch’s tight formations, scattering them into easy targets for her and Widowmaker to pick off, and leaving Reaper free to flank. They begin to strike as a team, and not as disgruntled individuals with a vaguely similar purpose. They begin winning. Sombra doesn’t care much about Talon’s ultimate goals, or is even very clear on what they are, but she appreciates both the thrill of victory and the security of an effective team. Tracer, in particular, is kept far too busy to give her further grief.

If Widowmaker is at all pleased or displeased with these changes, she makes no indication, but one can extrapolate that she spends more time in action, which means she makes more kills, which can only make her happier. Right?

She seems a little sharper during downtime, at least; Sombra notices that her blank, thousand-yard stare appears less often, and she even seems to pay attention during briefings. Her eyes seem clearer and her mind less fogged, and when Sombra speaks to her, she gets more responses than she used to. Once in awhile, she even laughs at her jokes. Sombra loves that. She doesn’t kid herself that it’s flirting, though, doesn’t kid herself that Widowmaker cares for anything beyond the bullets in her gun. All Akande’s influence, probably: It’s hard to be around him and not automatically try to be a little harder, a little brighter, a little more competent and charismatic, just to keep up. Even ol’ Gabriel seems less tormented, though Sombra has her own theories on that.

Confidence makes you complacent, though. Or worse, reckless.

Sombra can’t deny that it was because she was a little jealous that evening, watching from the balcony as Akande walked into the opulent casino with Widowmaker on his arm. Not that she envied his public leadership role; she knows she belongs in the metaphorical shadows. Still, she wouldn’t have minded being the one with the hot date.

“Ask her about St. Petersburg,” she quips, interjecting on their conversation via the open comm. They all but ignore her. Sombra can’t stand being ignored, which is why she adds, a little more quietly, “Ask her about Cairo.”

This time, the effect is satisfyingly immediate: Widowmaker halts in her tracks, stiffens, and then her eyes snap upward, sweeping the balconies, searching. Looking for her. Sombra’s breath catches as the sniper’s gaze locks on, glaring at her as intently as she might through a scope. Was that her imagination, or did her trigger finger twitch? Sombra’s already gone too far to backpedal, though. She leans on the railing with as much nonchalance as she can muster.

Akande, for his part, doesn’t turn around, but he slows his approach, pretending to be interested in a game of roulette.  “What happened in Cairo?” he asks, as calm and conversational as ever.

“Nothing,” Widowmaker’s voice is taut and unconvincing.

“Indeed,” says Akande with a nod. “I read the reports. An efficient mission with no complications or distractions. Talon should be lucky to have more of those.”

He turns a half-step as he speaks and takes his teammate’s elbow; his massive hand hovering just beneath it, not touching. She visibly relaxes, drops her stare, and allows him to lead her over to their contact.

Smooth. He’s smooth. Though he’d have to be an idiot not to know, and he’s anything but an idiot. Sombra’s mouth is dry. She takes a swallow of her drink, and the alcohol feels like a dagger going down. A number of gamblers turn their heads, unashamed in their attempts to get a better look at Widowmaker as she walks by. Sombra wants to punch their teeth in.  


 

A few weeks later, they’re in Venice. The costumes had been Akande’s idea, but it was Reaper who had designed, overseen, and designated the elaborate outfits. Sombra had watched with barely concealed amusement as he fussed over ruffles and color swatches, occasionally interjecting with obnoxious comments or deliberately unhelpful advice. She supposed that was why she got stuck with the jester outfit. It had been worth it, though. Even the facepaint.

She’s in the control room, now, watching Reaper finish off security. The tiny image of him dances around in his Masque of the Red Death until he dances out of range of the cameras, and Sombra swipes a screen and scrambles it into static. Once he’s in the clear, there’s not much left for her to do but wait. She nudges one of the guards’ bodies aside and takes his seat, putting her feet up on the console, and absentmindedly flicks one of her bells. They’re empty of clappers, soundless. A clever detail.  

Her comm crackles to life unexpectedly, and it’s Widowmaker’s voice, staticky with wind. Sombra sits up sharply. She’s calling from a closed channel, she can tell.

“Harlequin, status.”

“Uh, everything’s great. How about you?” Sombra replies, and then, remembering protocol, “I mean, status, Odile?”

The code names had been Reaper’s doing, too. Say what you will about the man, he commits to an aesthetic.

There’s a brief pause before Widowmaker replies, “All targets eliminated. Area clear. Heading to your position. Confirm.”

Sombra feels her heart leap, in trepidation as much as excitement. This was certainly not a part of Akande’s plan; they were supposed to hold position until the objective was complete. Was Widowmaker, of all people, going outside of her parameters?

“Harlequin, confirm.”

“Confirmed,” says Sombra, trying to keep her voice nonchalant. “See you soon, Odile.”

As a matter of fact, she hears Widowmaker before she sees her; the sound of her boots echoes as she ascends the narrow stairs. Sombra thinks for a moment, and then pulls the stupid hat off, combing bobby pins out of her hair. She can’t do much about the facepaint or the ruffles, but she cuts a bit more of a dashing figure without bells getting in her face. It’s not that she’s embarrassed; she finds the jester outfit hilarious, but ‘hilarious’ is not exactly the look you’re going for when a beautiful woman is about to meet with you.

A very beautiful woman.

In a very private, closed-off place.

In the middle of the night. And during a mission.

Oh.

The full implications click in Sombra’s mind just as Widowmaker enters the room. Sombra saw her getup only briefly before they split for their individual assignments, and remembers something like a big red bird. She didn’t recall how Widowmaker’s long braid coiled like a whip over her shoulder, or how soft and dark her skin seemed against the virulent crimson, or how quiet her face beneath the cruel, curving beak and flamboyant feathers. How did Reaper attach all that shit to her headgear? Sombra unconsciously reaches for the back of the chair behind her, to give her hands something to grip.

“Uh, hey,” she greets her, and adds, “What’s up?”

It’s not her best line, but Widowmaker looks away, almost shyly. She goes and leans her rifle in a corner of the room, but then she just stands there with it, her eyes a glimmer in the shadows. Eventually Sombra realizes she’s not planning on coming over, so she goes to her, leaving the fuzzy light of the monitors behind.

Sombra can see her face now; for a moment those yellow eyes seem soft and uncertain, almost plaintive, as though reaching for her. Don’t get sentimental, Sombra reminds herself. Widowmaker probably just nailed an excellent headshot and is feeling momentarily frisky. Why not? Grab the moment before it passes, and all that, Sombra doesn’t have a problem with - God! She’s still not even moving!

“Can you get on with it, already?” she blurts, a little more testily than she intended to, but the whole situation is making her tense. Widowmaker tilts her head to look at her, and Sombra blushes, but holds firm. “Look, if we’re going to - can we just - ?”

After a long moment, Widowmaker moves closer, and Sombra sucks in breath, readying for a kiss. She’s just thinking about the logistics of temperature - the floor is stone, which is not ideal, but the chairs might be an option - when a cold hand grabs her arm. It’s not a violent touch, but it’s not a tender one either. It’s intent. A chill seeps through the fabric and crawls up the hacker’s skin.

“Sombra.”

Widowmaker’s finally looking directly at her, and Sombra meets her gaze. She’s definitely does _not_ glance at her chest, even when she notices that it seems to be rising and falling slightly more rapidly than usual. She finally realizes: Widowmaker’s not horny - she’s nervous. Nervous because she has something to tell her. These would be easy enough emotions to read, if you weren’t operating off an assumption that there _weren’t_ any emotions to read.

“Sombra,” Widowmaker hesitates again, but finally tells her, “They will recondition me.”

Sombra’s blood turns to ice. She numbly covers Widowmaker’s hand with her own, her wires and hard-light nails resting softly on top of the other’s bare skin. “I know. I - ”

But Widowmaker isn’t done. It seems to be costing her an effort to say this, but she’s determined to get the words out. She squeezes Sombra’s arm as though drawing strength from its warmth.

“Sombra.”

“Yes?”

“They will recondition you, too.”

Slowly, agonizingly slowly, Widowmaker brings her free hand up to her temple, and forms a pistol with it, indicating the method of reconditioning that is reserved for mercenaries. Sombra blinks, and then a wave of anger breaks over her. She’s angry, so angry, what stupid irony, that what she had intended was to keep Widowmaker from being reconditioned in the first place, and it’s her own fault for being so...

She should have known better. She had lied to herself, made believe that it was all a clever plan and a selfish urge to get laid. Pretended she could hit it and quit it. In the end, she was no better than Tracer - that stupid, chipper idiot. That _nice_ little girl.

“I understand,” Sombra mutters. She moves her hand off Widowmaker’s, Widowmaker similarly releases her, and they separate.

In the blue shadows, the sniper looks lost for a moment, small, as though the red of her costume is swallowing her up. But then she gropes behind her for her rifle, becoming more herself again as she hefts its cold weight. She would rather hold it than her, Sombra is certain, and turns away.

“Adieu,” says the voice behind her.

“Good talk, Odile,” Sombra replies, as viciously and apathetically as she can, and listens to the tap-tap of her teammate descending the stairs. It’s not until the sound has fully faded away that she allows herself to collapse into one of the chairs, covering her face with her hands until her comm comes to life again, signaling the success of the mission.


	6. Chapter 6

Now that Talon's knuckled down on all the embezzlement, including Sombra's, they suddenly have a wealth of funding that can go towards a new agent's exorbitant fees. Their latest and greatest is apparently one of the legends of Blackwatch, known for her cutting-edge work in genetics and regeneration.   
  
“Without her, Widowmaker and I wouldn't be here today,” Reaper says, cryptically, though he sounds more resentful than affectionate.   
  
“That so? Remind me to thank her for ruining my life,” Sombra's only half-joking.

So far, only Reaper and Akande have met with their shiny new asset, in Venice; today's the day Moira officially comes into the fold of Talon. Sombra did her own digging, of course, but there's nothing like meeting someone in person to solidify your assessment.   
  
Moira's tall. Not as tall as Akande, but taller than both Reaper and Widow by several inches, which is no mean feat. She’s far past forty and dresses like she'd seen pictures of her teammates' outfits beforehand and decided to try and outdo them all at once. Sombra dislikes her immediately, though it’s the kind of dislike that could make them effective teammates.   
  
“Hey, new kid,” Sombra greets her, as they're introduced, and Moira looks at her with what seems like both disdainful amusement and condescending smugness. She seems like the type incapable of having fewer than four highly complex emotions at once.   
  
“Older than you,” she says, wagging a finger, and that's their introduction. When she turns to Widowmaker, there is no introduction or exchange of names. They give each other the briefest of nods, and then Moira sets about feeling the temperature of her skin, lifting her arm to inspect her tattoos, demanding a recount of recent injuries, asking about the healing process and scarification, and pressing her long-nailed thumb to her wrist to count her heartbeat. Sombra's surprised she doesn't try to check her teeth.    
  
Widowmaker tolerates this with a calm scowl as Moira chatters about micromachines, combat conditioning, and biotic transplants. Sombra wonders if and when Reaper had to go through this undignified process - surely not at the meeting in Venice? - and is suddenly relieved that she never permitted Talon to “augment” her. No amount of processing power, or dental benefits, is worth being endlessly poked at by this giraffe. 

Widowmaker turns her head – or rather, Moira turns it for her – and, perhaps inadvertently, catches Sombra’s eye. Sombra wrinkles her nose, making a sympathetic face, but the other doesn't react. Which is only to be expected.   
  
“Are you quite finished, Moira?” Akande rumbles, and their new member finally, reluctantly, leaves Widowmaker alone. Dismissed, the sniper drops back into her chair like a puppet with cut strings.    
  
“Yeah,  _ Moira _ , we're getting old here,” Sombra leans forward on the table, languid with exaggerated boredom. It's never too soon to start needling.   
  
Moira flashes her an openly hostile grin, and stalks to the front of the room, pulling up a wide blue screen as she does so. “Yes, yes. Now then...”   


The screen condenses, shrinks, and reforms into a slowly rotating blueprint of the Overwatch watchpoint on Gibraltar.   
  
“Moira has a plan for us,” Akande explains, authoritative even from his sitting position. “She's devised a way to get Overwatch out of our hair.”   
  
Sombra giggles, though it seems she’s the only one who picked up on the subtle, sophisticated humor of a bald man referring to one’s hair.   
  
Moira clears her throat, and says, “Well, you see. Cut off the head, and the body will die. A principal principle in both warfare and medicine.”   
  
She pauses, meaningfully, and stares at her teammates, waiting for them to laugh. They stare back at her for several minutes, until it becomes apparent that she's not going to continue until her joke has successfully landed.   
  
“Ha,” Reaper forces a chuckle.   
  
Satisfied, Moira goes on, “A very simple operation, I think. Overwatch is a, hm, persistent but tenuous organization. Without proper leadership, they will fall to pieces. Therefore, we should not waste our time fighting them as a group. A surgical strike is what is called for. Once the head is gone, the body will wither on its own. And who is the head of Overwatch?”    
  
There's another prolonged silence before the others realize that she's actually expecting an answer to that question. Akande maintains the silence of a teacher waiting for their students to come to the conclusion on their own.   
  
“Morrison,” Reaper suggests, and Akande immediately snorts in disdain.   
  
“Morrison's a has-been,” he declares, and Sombra puts a hand to her mouth to hide her smirk. She can tell from Reaper's satisfied pose that he only said that because he wanted to hear that exact answer. 

Moira taps her long fingernails impatiently. “Come on. They are your biggest foe and no one even knows who their leader is?”   
  
“Amari,” Widowmaker offers, and clarifies, unnecessarily, “The younger one.”   
  
Akande shakes his head. “Amari was one of the greatest,” he says. “Her daughter shows potential. But she is still a rookie.”   
  
Widowmaker shrugs, which is apparently the extent of her feelings on both Amari and her rookie daughter.   
  
Sombra rests her head on her arms, insolent, like she used to do at her desk in school, and calls out the right answer as though she couldn’t care less. “It’s Winston.” 

Moira frowns in confusion, glancing at Reaper. “The monkey,” he explains, and the geneticist snaps her fingers.   
  
“Ah! Yes! Exactly! The monkey! We will -” She taps the wire mesh of Gibraltar, and it zooms into a spot on the roof. “You see? We will assassinate the monkey!”   
  
“He's an ape, actually,” Sombra mutters into her elbow.   


“Thank you, Moira,” Akande stands, and the previously indomitable scientist shrinks meekly away. “I can take it from here.”   
  
The tension in the room visibly relaxes as Akande takes over: Reaper uncrosses his arms, Widowmaker’s gaze stops drifting, Sombra sits up, and even Moira looks more at home cross-legged and poised in her chair, her wicked fingers clasped attentively in front of her.

Akande presses something on a keypad; the Gibraltar blueprint zooms out, and a section of hallway lights up in yellow. “For this to work properly,” he says. “It has to be devastating. It has to happen right under their noses. Thanks to our Vishkar contact, we have some crucial intel on Wiston’s daily routine on the Gibraltar base.”

Moira raises her hand, but doesn’t wait to be called on to speak. “Forgive me, I’ve been out of the loop. Vishkar is in bed with both us and Overwatch, is that correct? Does that make the Vaswani woman our double agent? If so, this might be accomplished much more neatly.”

“To say Vishkar is ‘in bed’ with Overwatch is an overstatement. It’s something like a cuckold situation,” Akande concentrates on the keyboard and presses something with careful precision. He has a charming search-and-poke method of typing, but with such huge fingers, he can hardly help it.

An image of the Vishkar architect, known most commonly by her callsign ‘Symmetra’, appears on the screen, peering at them from beneath an arched brow. Sombra is impressed at how well the small photograph communicates her aura of haughty scorn. You almost want to apologize to the pixels.

“Vaswani is not our contact,” Akande explains. “She feeds information to Vishkar, which, in turn, feeds it to us. Vaswani is unaware of this second step. She believes in Vishkar’s public stance, which is that they support Overwatch.”

“I don’t think I need to remind you,” he says, speaking now to Sombra, Widowmaker, and Reaper, but clearly still for Moira’s benefit. “That Vaswani is under protection level Alpha. You are not to harm her, or allow significant harm to come to her, even if it means risking the objective. She is also classified at threat level Falcon. Therefore the best course of action is to avoid engaging with her at all costs. Our relationship with Vishkar is vital and must be maintained.”

The agents murmur their assent, and Akande closes the image, returning to the highlighted hallway in the Gibraltar base. “Based on our intel from Vishkar, we know that Winston heads from his rooms down this hallway at approximately oh-eight-hundred hours each day.”

He methodically presses a sequence of keys, causing small yellow figures to appear in the wire mesh. The largest of them stands out, in red.

“The Overwatch agents most likely to be in proximity will be Oxton, dos Santos, and Amari. Oxton and dos Santos are threat level Puma, and Amari is threat level Falcon. Winston himself -” Akande pauses, frowning at a memory. “- is threat level Raptor. Ideally, you will make the kill without having to engage with any of them. Questions?”

“Yeah,” says Sombra. “How exactly are we doing this?”

Akande is about to reply when Widowmaker laughs, a high, clear, and shockingly genuine laugh that rings off the walls. Moira’s head snaps around, and, after staring for a moment, she begins furiously scribbling something on her notepad.

Meanwhile Widowmaker puts a finger to her lip, smiling the self-satisfied smile of the indispensable. “How do you think?”

 

 

“This is fun,” Sombra says. “We haven’t been on a mission just the two of us since - well, for a while.”

Widowmaker makes the faintest hum in response. She’s locked in position, her rifle trained on the tiny skylight that’s been jimmied open just enough to allow a small square of access to the Gibraltar base. Too small for a person, but wide enough for a bullet. Sombra considers, idly, how Widowmaker’s shots never went wide throughout all of their little...indiscretion. She supposes that the pressure to perform, especially under Akande watchful eye, outweighs some of the emotional turmoil. Mind over matter. That’s the Talon way.

She checks the screen that she is streaming to Widowmaker’s visor: It shows Winston’s progress from his rooms to the hallway, accompanied by a small readout of his animal vitals. Widowmaker is also tracking him through her infra-sight, a big blood-red and green-blue blotch; Sombra can see it through her screens as a small projector on Widow’s visor shutters it into holographic existence. He’s almost there.

STATUS, SOMBRA? A small line of text clicks into the top corner of her screens. As part of their stealth op, they’d foregone radio communications. Sombra calls up a small, circular keyboard beneath one palm and replies, her fingers dancing with lightning-speed muscle memory.

TARGET ON THE MOVE. WIDOW AT THE READY. ESTIMATION UNTIL CONTACT 114.55 SECONDS. IS THIS JEFE OR CABRON?

There’s almost a ridiculously long pause, but that tells her nothing. Neither Akande nor Reaper are very fast typers.

WHAT

NEVER MIND YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE. SOMBRA OUT

She doesn’t have time to chat; she has her hands full keeping Overwatch’s security system from detecting two Talon agents on their roof. Most cameras and sensors were easy to bug, and a cloaking field turns them into a faint shimmer to anyone glancing up, but to keep Athena’s A.I. busy, Sombra’s running a sophisticated Trojan Horse program (Reaper would appreciate the thematic appropriateness). As far as Overwatch knows, Athena’s encountered a logical inconsistency and is attempting to detangle it; each time she gets close, Sombra feeds her a sliver of contradictory data to keep her thinking, all the while bugging her programs with a homemade virus. It’s simple, elegant, and vague enough to keep anyone from going on high alert. 

STATUS, SOMBRA?

58.22 SECONDS. SHUT UP AND LET ME WORK

Widowmaker hasn’t blinked for a full minute. Her breathing is imperceptible, her heartbeat so slow that Sombra’s scanners are concerned that it’s stopped. The sniper can maintain this level of corpse-like focus only momentarily, but a moment is all she needs. Winston’s at the top of the hallway now, knuckling down it - Sombra’s not breathing, either, as she watches her malicious programs hum along - nearly, nearly - he’s just coming into view in the sliver of the sunroof, but Widowmaker holds, waiting for the nape of his neck to be revealed - one second, two - her finger closes around the trigger -

Something cracks, loudly, in Sombra’s ear.

For an instant she thinks it’s Widowmaker taking the shot, but then she feels the thud of impact against the side of her head. Sombra’s screens flash red with warnings before vanishing, replaced by a scroll of text in her VR contacts.

BIOSERVER 2 CONNECTION LOST   
RETRYING……………………..FAILED  
RETRYING……………………..FAILED  
RETRYING……………………..FAILED  
CRITICAL ERROR…………………….  
ATTEMPTING SWITCH TO BACKUP SERVER…..FAILED  
BIO-INCONSISTENCIES DETECTED  
ATTEMPTING NANOMACHINE RELEASE…….FAILED  
WARNING! SEEK MEDICAL ATTENTION!  
ATTEMPTING SHUTDOWN…………...43%

The moment is lost. Widowmaker’s staring at her, her eyes slowly widening in horror, but Sombra can only see her grip loosening on the gun. Pick it back up, she tries to yell at her, I’m fine, Winston hasn’t seen us yet, you can still make the shot, you can -

But aloud, all she can manage is, “I’m...”

Sombra had instantly realized that at least one of the fiber-optic implants on her head had been mangled, severing her connection, but it takes her a full few minutes to become aware of the wet warmth trickling past her ear, the surging pain, the darkness at the corners of her eyes.

“...offline.”

ATTEMPTING SHUTDOWN……98%

She knows she’s going to faint even before her knees thud dully against the roof, but as she pitches forward, someone catches her, someone breaks her fall. Sombra knows the old line about hearing screams, and realizing that they’re your own. But she’s almost positive that that’s not her voice. 

  
  
  
  


She awakens to the familiar thrum of a copter. The left side of her head feels dully saturated with pain; heavy and stiff, too, she can feel the rough texture of bandages. With her systems offline, Sombra’s world is suddenly very small and dark. Instinct reminds her not to move or open her eyes until she has a read on the situation; she pricks her ears and listens. Widowmaker is shouting, and not just to be heard over the noise of the engine.

“You knew? The whole time, you knew?”

Reaper - Gabriel’s - voice comes next. It sounds strangely clear and unmuffled, as though he’s not wearing his mask, but strained, as though his teeth are grit. “We knew….that there was...a possibility.”

“A possibility?” Widowmaker shrieks. “A  _ possibility _ ? And you didn’t think to tell us?”

“It was considered an…acceptable risk,” Gabriel replies. “Ana never, ever shoots to kill when she can disable ins -”

“Your precious Ana! You were  _ certain _ ? Certain enough to let Sombra die?”

The copter rocks a little, as though a weight has suddenly shifted. Sombra automatically grips the ground before she can remember she’s pretending to be asleep still, and relaxes her arms. The emotion in Widowmaker’s voice is disturbingly raw. Sombra’s never heard her so much as raise her voice to this degree.

“For god’s sake, she’s not dead - sit down, Widow -”

“Don’t tell me to sit down! Don’t tell me to do anything! You set us up! You - ”

“ _ I don’t like it either! _ ” the other snarls, and there’s the metallic thud of something heavy colliding with the helicopter wall. A faint communication from the pilot stammers something about flight stability; the agents ignore it. “If it had been up to me, this mission never would have happened. But it’s out of my hands -”

“You should have done something,” Through her anger, Widowmaker sounds on the verge of tears. “If you thought Amari was alive, you should have told me. You should have sent only me! I would have killed her. I would have done it properly this time. I would have shot her other eye out - I would have made sure she was dead - I would have...!”

“Amelié,” Gabriel says, more gently. “Try to calm down. You’ll strain yourself.”

“Don’t call me Amelié,” There’s a sob in her voice now. 

Sombra can’t stand it anymore, she opens her eyes a peek. One is obscured by the bandages, but through the other she can just about glimpse her teammates at the far wall. Gabriel’s face is a shadowy blur. He has a gauntleted hand on Widowmaker’s shoulder, which seems very thin and delicate beneath the massive claws. Widowmaker is subdued, bent almost double in her seat, her head in her hands, hiding her tears. 

It’s a strange moment, strangely intimate; even with eyes everywhere, Sombra had never seen Reaper and Widowmaker exchange more than two non-mission-specific words with each other. She’d always sensed they were close, though, knew they had shared history and things in common. But to actually see it is something else. Not to mention…

The revelation rises up in Sombra like nausea; her bruised brain screams in protest as she tries run the new information through it. Too exhausting. Now’s not the time. She allows the pain to overwhelm her and the darkness to return.


	7. Chapter 7

When she wakes up again, it’s in a room made quiet by the hum of machines. The unmistakably pale face of Moira is looming over her, which is enough to make Sombra wish she’d died in transit.

“Ugh,” Sombra groans. “You.”

“Me,” Moira says smugly, in a tone suggesting _she’s_ pleased to see herself, even if Sombra isn’t.

Sombra squints up at the ceiling. The light grey paint and fluorescent lights, plus the slightly sickly smell of disinfectant, means she can only be in Talon’s med bay. Better than on the operating table, she supposes. She props herself up into a sitting position, leaning on her elbows.

“The wound was relatively minor,” Moira informs her, still in that gleeful tone. “The majority of the damage was - hmm - structural...would you like to know who shot you?”

The cord of a saline drip rattles as Sombra raises her hand to her head. It’s only lightly bandaged, now; she can feel the faint vibration of nanomachines still swarming the wound. More concerning are the hard guts of her cranial implants, decimated by that single shot. She turns to Moira.

“Ana Amari shot me,” Sombra says. “She was believed dead, and Overwatch maintained that fiction even after she contacted them, in order to keep her as an ace in the hole. You -” she jabs an accusatory finger. “- or Akande, maybe, must have suspected this, and sent us on that mission as bait. To either rob Overwatch of their leader, or force them to show their hand.”

Moira stares at her in undisguised shock, and Sombra laughs in her face. “Didn’t think I was that smart, did you, _jirafa_?”

The geneticist scowls and turns away, pretending to busy herself with something on the far table. Duly pleased with herself, Sombra takes the opportunity to inspect the damage: Her implants are all offline, and don’t seem to have been tampered with, though she can’t know for sure until she can connect to an outside power source and run diagnostics. There aren’t many in Talon who would be capable of interfacing with her biotech systems, though, so she’s not too worried. Even Moira, who affects expertise on everything, had gingerly worked around them.

Her jacket and bodysuit are gone; she’s been put in loose, generic hospital clothes. A bulky wireless sensor taped to her chest presumably monitors her heart and filters out interference from her implants. The IV needle is plastered into her arm, bisecting her subdermal wires. Sombra chews her lip, thoughtfully, and touches her head again, finding a second sensor just behind the wound.

“Overwatch isn’t the only one who showed their hand,” Moira says, suddenly, with her back still turned. Sombra frowns, at first not understanding the implication, and then it hits her.

“Where’s Widow?” she demands, kicking the blankets away, trying to stand up. A white-hot pain explodes behind her eyes; she falls back, gritting her teeth, trying to blink it away. “Where is she?”

“Not your concern,” Moira says, smoothly, suddenly all pleasant and unruffled again. “Lie back down, there’s a good girl.”

Sombra doesn’t want to comply, but she’s clearly in no shape to be breaking out of the med bay and rampaging through Talon. Yet. She screws her eyes shut and flops down; the pain begins to subside. The doctor comes over, smug, casual, her hands in the pockets of her lab coat, the sleeves rolled up to the elbows.

“You bitch,” Sombra’s too tired to even inject venom into the word. “What did you do to her?”

Moira’s eyebrows contract, her face becomes a stormy mask of indigence. “What did _I_ do to her? What did _you_ do to her? Her levels are completely off-base! Her vitals are a mess! Do you have any idea how much progress you almost undid with your foolish…pretensions?”

“‘Pretensions’?” Sombra snorts. “That’s a funny word for sex.”

“Cot _ius_ ,” Moira’s voice goes up to an amusingly high pitch. “Is one thing. This is another. She is not a toy for you to play with. Widowmaker is my life’s work! And you -”

“What about Reaper? What’s he, chopped liver?”

Moira puts a thoughtful finger to her chin, suddenly forgetting her anger in her eagerness to talk about her work. Sombra’s already figured out that chattiness and self-satisfaction are her most exploitable weaknesses. She notices that Moira’s left hand - her dominant hand, if that intel was good - remains hidden in her pocket.

“Reaper was...an experiment. A highly successful experiment, yes, but I merely augmented him. Widowmaker, I built from the ground up. Lacroix was a base, but _she_ \- I constructed her. I created her. Everything she is, I brought into being. Almost like a daughter to me. A perfect daughter.”

“Jesus,” Sombra can’t keep the disgust out of her voice.

“Yes, impressive, isn’t it?” Moira hums. “But let us return to _your_ status. The biological damage is of no lasting concern, though, as a merc, you have been billed a portion of the fee for my materials and time.”

“Great,” Sombra absentmindedly flicks through her mental list of contacts, wondering who might know about Moira’s personal finances.

“As for your implants, it says here you have denied Talon permission to repair or augment them. It seems you prefer some back alley tinkerer? Such a pity,” As she speaks, Moira idly runs one of her long nails down the inside of Sombra’s arm, as though slicing it open with a scalpel. “I’ve always wondered how biotech implants might enhance na-”

Sombra snatches her arm away. “Keep wondering.”

Moira gives her an offended frown. “We’ll see. Right now, my directive is to make sure you get your rest.”

The doctor’s left hand, the one in her pocket, contracts; Sombra sees the muscles in her arm tense and realizes, too late, what Moira must be holding in there. She scrambles for the drip in her arm, intending to rip it out, but she can already feel the dose of sedatives coursing through her veins. Moira takes Sombra’s hand and moves it away from the IV with insultingly gentle force.

“You know what they always say about you troublemakers? You’re only such angels when you’re sleeping.”

Fuck you, Sombra tries to say, but it comes out hoarse and faint. She can only hope her glare is enough to communicate the sentiment before the drug takes her under.

 

 

 

For a moment she forgets where she is, but the antiseptic smell reminds her. The room is dim, faint light peers through the slatted blinds, and there’s a woman sitting by her bed: too quiet, too subdued to be Moira. For a moment Sombra simply lies there, listening to the too-loud sound of her own breathing. She knows the identity of this other woman, but she can’t be sure who she _is_.

At last, she says, hesitantly, “ _Vidua?”_

The woman stands up in a sudden motion, and a familiarly chilly hand touches Sombra’s arm, just beneath the injection site, now empty of its needle.

“Freelancer,” Widowmaker replies, like a code phrase. Sombra exhales.

“ _Gracias a mierda_ ,” she swears, and struggles to sit up. Her limbs feel heavy and leaden, her head fuzzy with drug-induced sleep. She gives up halfway, resting on her elbows, and says, “Come here.”

The other woman hesitates, and a sliver of fear cuts through Sombra. “Come here,” she repeats, teetering on one elbow as she reaches out a plaintive arm. “ _Please_. Don’t make me beg.”

She tries to keep her tone light, but the fear rises in her throat. At last Widowmaker bends over her, and Sombra throws her arms around her neck, pulling her close; a cold arm slides behind her back to support her.

“I thought for sure they’d reconditioned you.”

Widowmaker shakes her head, her cheek brushing Sombra’s ear. “No. They are still…assessing.”

“They wouldn’t tell me anything,” says Sombra, and shifts backwards to lean against the metal bed frame. Squinting as her eyes adjust to the dim light - it’s a long time since she’s been without her night-vision - she sees Widowmaker is wearing a thin cotton shirt and sweatpants. Like Sombra, she’s been stripped of her equipment; she’s not even wearing shoes.

“Nor I,” says Widowmaker. “They would not even tell me if you were -”

She breaks off, casts her gaze away. Sombra’s hand is still on her arm, and she feels her trembling slightly. From exhaustion, relief, fear? She looks as drained and as weak as Sombra feels. Sombra wants to kiss her, but she hesitates. If this was a dream, that would be the exact moment she woke up.

“I’m fine,” she assures her, instead. “They’ve been keeping me sedated, that’s all.”

Widowmaker’s gaze snaps back up and pierces through her, her eyes bright and yellow in the surrounding dark. “We do not have much time. They will come looking for me, and for you. Doctor O’Deorian is pushing for your termination.”

“Oh? I hope the severance package is good,” Sombra furrows her brow as a dull headache begins to pound behind her eyes.

Widowmaker misses the joke, or perhaps ignores it. “Sombra, they will kill you.”

“We don’t know that,” Sombra says, pressing her thumb between her eyes to try and alleviate the pain. “What time is it? How long have I been out? How long have you been…missing?”

“It is oh-four hundred hours. It’s been forty-eight hours since we returned from the mission, and…perhaps twenty-five minutes since I left.”

“Half an hour? They’ll have noticed for sure. We have to get you -”

“Not me,” Widowmaker interrupts her. “I know what will happen to me. It cannot be avoided. But you - you must leave Talon while there’s still time.”

“Leave Talon? Is that a joke?” Sombra rattles her dead wires. “I won’t get far like this.”

“Go to Overwatch. Plead amnesty. Offer information. I have a….a contact. They will protect you. You can -”

“No, no, no, this is all too much,” Sombra presses her thumb harder against the headache, digging her fingernail into her skin. “Let’s - let’s get out of here, for starters. Let’s go to my server room. I can think there. I can connect.”

Widowmaker nods. Sombra summons all her strength to swings her legs out of the bed, but the moment she puts her weight on her knees, they buckle beneath her; Widowmaker darts forward and catches her as she stumbles.

“Forty-eight hours, huh?” Sombra laughs. “Just give me a -”

But Widowmaker just bends down and scoops her up like a child, cradling her against her chest; Sombra muffles her squeak of surprise, and then her protests, and allows herself to be carried. Widowmaker walks slowly, as blind in the dark without her visor as Sombra is without her contacts. As they exit the med bay, Sombra wriggles in her arms.

“Put me down,” she says. “Put me down, I can walk now.”

Widowmaker does, and then shushes her, indicating a small, dome-shaped camera in the corner. Sombra knows it’s there; even without her tech, she has the locations and blind spots of Talon’s cameras memorized. Right now, they’re in full view.

“They’re watching us,” Widowmaker observes.

“Nothing we can do about it,  _vidua,_ ” Sombra says, grimly, taking a couple experimental steps. She’d love to bust the thing, even just for spite, but without her systems or even her gun, that’s far beyond her capabilities. Widowmaker glowers at the camera as though she can shoot it down with a glare. If looks could kill, they’d have no problem.

“Come on,” Sombra’s muscles are still stiff and sluggish, but she takes Widow’s hand and leads her in a half-run towards the server room. The silence, the emptiness, the lack of resistance is chilling. It means the higher-ups are still watching, and waiting, and deciding. Waiting for them to hole up in the server room, where they will be trapped like foxes in a den.

Widowmaker seems to be thinking the same thing. “ _Le lapin court, le faucon regarde_ ,” she mutters.

Sombra eyes her over her shoulder as she actives the handprint lock. “That a French proverb or something?”

The other shakes her head, ill at ease. “No. It is a sniper one.”

Sombra’s language skills are a little rusty, but she knows enough to know what happens to _lapins_ around here. She ushers Widowmaker down into the room, turning the lights on, closing the door behind them, sealing them in.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone, sorry this chapter took me so long, and that it's relatively short. It was really tough to write and I really agonized over perfecting it since it's kind of the emotional climax. Thanks for...well, your patience!

The consoles and monitors greet her like old friends. Sombra inhales the comfort of their chilly glow, their mild humming, and then sets them to work running a finely-tuned bug-squashing program. Talon's tech-heads are fond of trying to install surveillance equipment in her server room, and Sombra is fond of reminding them that they're losing this particular arms race. Since she's a merc, and the server room is unofficially her territory, there's nothing strictly preventing her from destroying their devices. They can only keep hiding them and hoping she won't discover them _this_ time.  
  
As she expected, they've taken advantage of her absence. The report scrolls in, detailing the specs and locations of each device that's been disabled; Sombra's eyes flick over it as she divests herself of the remainder of the medical paraphernalia. She drops the wireless sensors unceremoniously to the floor, picks at the tape that had been holding the IV needle in place, and fussily readjusts her wires. The hospital pajamas she will have to deal with later. She notices for the first time that they're decorated with tiny pink rabbit heads, a sad approximation of the famous D.va logo. Is Talon dabbling in bootleg merch, now? Some kind of side-scheme? It's a more amusing thought to dwell on than the fact that someone must have undressed her at some point.  
  
Widowmaker watches in silence, having settled herself a respectful distance away; Sombra can see her from the corner of her eye. She scans the report once more, then closes the program and flicks open a small hatch on the console, extracting a wire she hasn't had to use in a long time.  
  
“Hey, can you plug me in?”  
  
“Hm?”  
  
Widowmaker comes forward to take the proffered end of the cord, suddenly standing so close behind her that Sombra can feel a faint tickle of air when she breathes. The hacker bends her neck and sweeps her hair aside to reveal a small port at the base of her skull.  
  
“In here,” she prompts.  
  
She could have done it herself, of course she could've, but she couldn't pass up the small intimacy. Widowmaker places her free hand firmly against the back of Sombra's neck as she inserts the hard-light connector; Sombra braces against her touch to make it click home. Feeling the sudden flow of energy into her hardware, Sombra straightens up, letting out a relieved sigh, and Widowmaker moves away, the ghost of her touch tingling strangely on Sombra's back alongside the warmer tingle of her systems returning to life.  
  
A lengthy damage report appears in her VR contacts. Sombra performs a cold boot, recircuting power to bypass the damaged section, and her implants respond, glowing violet in the semidarkness. It's hardly sustainable, and she'll need a real repair soon, but for now it's enough just to be online again. When she's shut down, it's like being half-dead.  
  
“You're back,” Widowmaker observes.  
  
Sombra turns, careful of the attached wire. “Yeah,” she says. “I, uh – it looks like they've already cut me out of the network, though. Only have my local data here.”  
  
“Talon has yet to take action,” says Widowmaker. “Perhaps they hope we will simply conclude that our situation is hopeless, and return without resistance.”  
  
“Watching and waiting. Sounds like Akande.”  
  
“Indeed.”  
  
“I could try hacking, but that would probably bring them down on us, guns a-blazing. What to do, what to do...” Sombra wrinkles her brow, going over scenarios in her head, trying to rapidly dissect the odds.  
  
Any and all of their equipment is no doubt under lock and key; all they really have is Widowmaker's dubious combat conditioning and Sombra's damaged cyberware. There's some equipment in the server room, maybe even a gun somewhere, but hardly a bugout bag. And Talon is no doubt watching the exits, ready to turn on the offensive at any moment.  
  
“The situation _is_ a bit hopeless,” Sombra concludes. “Er, we could try my last-resort escape route. Involves crawling through vents. It might -”  
  
“Go, then.” Widowmaker cuts her off. Her concern and anxiety have flattened back into an intent, calculating demeanor. “You run. I will distract them, buy you time. They consider me the higher priority.”  
  
Sombra raises one eyebrow, but then the other one comes with it. It's a two-eyebrow kind of situation. “And then you'll...meet up with me later, somehow?”  
  
“No.”  
  
Sombra crosses her arms and frowns at her in silence until Widowmaker shifts uncomfortably, emotion trickling back into her face. “You have a greater chance without me.”  
  
“Bullshit. I'm not running unless you come with me.”  
  
“I cannot -”  
  
“Why not?”  
  
“There is a kill switch.”  
  
“A kill switch?”  
  
“In me.”  
  
Sombra stares at her in shock. Nothing in the any of the reports or communications she bcc’d herself on so much as alluded to this. It must be a last resort, a final line of protection; a heavily guarded secret, discussed only in code. Bio-kill switches, which can be remotely triggered to force a person into a coma-like state, are considered some of the most egregious of human rights violations. Talon would be blackballed from even fellow terrorist organizations if this got out. It’d be the perfect piece of leverage - if Sombra had any means of proving it. As it is, it’s only another reminder of just how tightly Talon can squeeze them. Sombra leans back on the table, covering her face with her hands, her headache returning.  
  
“Damnit,” she chokes. “God....damn it.”  
  
Widowmaker touches her arm. “You are a mercenary,” she says, her voice low and urgent. “Talon will let you go more easily. But if I accompany you, then they will fight us tooth and nail, because I am a recoverable asset. That is why I must stay.”  
  
“And be reconditioned,” Sombra adds dully, peeking through her fingers.  
  
“...Yes.”  
  
“So when they've reconditioned you, and send you to eliminate me, what then?”  
  
“I...” Her touch falls away. “It...will not matter.”  
  
“To you, you mean.”  
  
The hum of computers suddenly seems very loud in the silence.  
  
“You don't  _want_ to be reconditioned,” Sombra says. “Do you?”  
  
Widowmaker's eyes, almost pale and glowing in the artificial light, widen, and then drop guiltily away. Sombra unconsciously clenches her fists against her cheeks, digging her hard-light nails into her palms until they clip through them.  
  
“Do you?”  
  
“There was a time when I did.”  
  
Sombra's heart pounds, and she opens her mouth and then closes it again, the follow-up question sticking in her throat. As though reading her mind, Widowmaker quickly assures her, “I do not anymore.”  
  
“You're certain?” It comes out in an anxious half-laugh.  
  
There's a tense moment of consideration, and then, with finality, “Yes. I am certain.”  
  
Sombra shakes her head, exhales heavily and puts her hand to her chest in a mockery of her own relief. “Whew. You had me scared there for a moment, _viuda_.”  
  
“I missed those shots on purpose, you know,” the sniper says, with a tinge of professional pride.  
  
“That so?”  
  
“Sombra, I –“ Widowmaker becomes hesitant again, tense, careful over each word. “When we – I began to enjoy it again. Being able to feel. But I did not doubt – I did not think I would do anything but temporarily delay my reconditioning. I didn't - I merely ceased to actively seek it. I always assumed it would be inevitable, which is why – it is the only solution I know of.”  
  
Sombra nods slowly. She understands better than she would like; she's well acquainted with the power and freedom in being able to stop feeling and simply exist. It's a discipline she can only practice, though, or maintain the illusion of. To be like that way always, to be divorced from all emotion and empathy – well. The drawbacks may be glaring, but Sombra can't pretend not to understand the personal as well as professional benefits. And of course Widowmaker would want to return to what is familiar, what she knows and does best. It occurs to Sombra that this thread of logic, this natural desire for reconditioning, might be an aspect of the conditioning itself.  
  
“But it's not what you want,” Sombra repeats, trying to solidify the concept in both their minds.  
  
“It is difficult to – but yes, I believe I  –” Widowmaker heaves a long sigh. “As I said, I always considered it...inescapable. My desire for it was not a factor. But -”

The hacker steps forward, pulling a little to bring the wire with her. She has to tilt her head up only slightly to look up at her; without her boots, Widowmaker is not so much taller than her after all.  
  
“ _I_ don't want you to be reconditioned,” Sombra says. "I like you like this."  
  
“You are the reason for it," Widowmaker replies. Her face contorts with thought, and then eases into a soft smile, "If I cannot determine my own desires, perhaps it is enough to know yours."  
  
Sombra's still thinking of a reply to that when Widowmaker moves forward and kisses her, long and slow. Sombra pulls her close, pressing their bodies together, and shivers: from relief, from excitement, from exhaustion, and, admittedly, from cold. The server room is chilly, and the other woman is like a pillar of ice. Perhaps realizing this, and feeling the prickle of goosebumps on Sombra's skin, she pulls away abruptly.  
  
“I have a space heater,” Sombra says quickly, heading off her concern.  
  
Widowmaker's worried frown becomes a grin. “Show me.”


	9. Chapter 9

A server room is kept cold and dry for the computers’ sake, which is where the space heater comes in. It’s a necessity for the long hours Sombra spends down here, in the only area on the base she feels secure enough to work and sleep. Talon isn’t exactly the kind of place you can just take a nap in the break room or open your laptop at a conference table, and mercenaries aren’t provided official quarters. Not that Sombra would use them even if she had them. The server room is dark, secluded, and rarely used, all of which spells safety to her.

It seemed an eternity ago she was down here browsing through files on Widowmaker, and now she’s curled up against the actual woman, on a futon mattress that barely has enough space for the two of them - Sombra never really expected to have company down here. It’s comfortable enough, though, with their bodies intertwined, and the heater blasting hot air across Sombra’s back, dispelling the chill of both the surrounding room and the other woman's body. Widowmaker idly traces the spine of of Sombra’s implants as they kiss, her touch no longer frigid but only a pleasant coolness that brushes between bare skin and the unfeeling metal.

If only it didn't get so arid. When her mouth grows unbearably dry, Sombra has to take a break and crawl over to where she keeps her stash of brightly-labeled cans and bottles. She finds a sports drink, cracks it open, and takes a swallow, feeling the sugar and electrolytes settle in her empty stomach. She then offers the bottle to Widowmaker, who politely but firmly turns her nose up at it.

“You want something else? I got other drinks.” 

“Hm,” Widowmaker rolls onto her stomach, leaning on her folded elbows, apparently enjoying the sudden abundance of mattress space. “Mineral water?”

Sombra nearly chokes on her next sip of the artificial lemon-lime. "'Fraid not."

“Sparkling, then.”

“You’re funny, _viuda_.”

“I was not intending to be,” Widowmaker keeps her face placid and innocent, but the corner of her mouth betrays her with a twitch. “Humor is generally beyond my capabilities.”

“Oh, please,” Sombra takes a last sip of the sports drink and sets it down. “You made that joke back in Cairo, remember?”

“Did I?”

Sombra crawls back to the mattress, back to her, and kisses her again; Widowmaker responds in force, cupping Sombra’s cheek and then trailing down to her breast, which she squeezes. She moves her mouth over her neck, her shoulders, her chest; her teeth scrape lightly, delicately, and then a little more sharply as her hands rove lower, gripping harder. Sombra slides her own hands into Widowmaker’s sleek, soft hair, feeling it tangle with her wires as Widowmaker pushes her gently down. She’s surprised when Widowmaker keeps going, when she moves down past her navel and nudges her thighs apart with real intent. Lifting her head a little, Sombra sees her shift her knees off the bottom edge of the mattress, positioning herself.

“Hey - you never did _this_ in Cairo.”

Widowmaker’s only response is a shrug that bunches and relaxes the muscles between her shoulders and makes it seem like the spider on her back is wiggling its forelegs. The red hourglass eyes Sombra, not mockingly this time, but conspiratorially, and then Widowmaker’s head goes down and Sombra stops anthropomorphizing her tattoo. She pulls a hand from Widowmaker’s hair to clutch at her own breast, circling her nipple with her hard-light nails: They tingle a little, when she presses them close and they clip through her skin.

It’s different than Cairo, feels different, perhaps because they are no longer Talon agents trying to slip the experience neatly into the continuity of their careers. Everything's unmoored and uncertain now, they have nothing they'll have to return to, no professionalism to maintain. It’s reasonably sexy, once you get past the sinking sense of dread. Especially, Sombra finds, to not have to adhere to her carefully constructed persona, not have to keep maintaining that she’s in control, holding all the cards, orchestrating everything. It lacks the razor-sharp excitement of the chase, the game, but in its place is a feeling of weightlessness and relief. Like removing a bra at the end of the day.

And Widowmaker, or Amélie, or _viuda_ , or whatever combination of those she was now, becoming not a wild animal to be tiptoed around, nor a porcelain doll to be handled gingerly, nor a system to be hacked, but just another woman, a human woman, after all. 

That woman plunges deeper, burying her face between Sombra’s legs, the arch of her nose pressing her clit, and Sombra groans and bucks her hips, driving her digital nails into herself. Widowmaker is relentless, without needing to breathe: Sombra feels the orgasm building, quick and steady, but then, right on the precipice, Widowmaker pauses. Sombra can hear her panting, slowly but heavily, and the press of her cheek on her thigh. Sombra holds her breath, stiffens her body, willing herself into patience. She's just about to start tugging at Widowmaker's hair when, in a swift motion, Widowmaker swipes her tongue over her clit and at the same time slides two cold and sudden fingers into her. Sombra arches her back and cries out, her legs shaking with the sudden release.

"Jeez. Fuck," the hacker swears vaguely, and in response hears Widowmaker's pleased, and slightly muffled, chuckle.

For a moment Sombra lies still, breathing, eyes closed and her mind a pleasant blank. She can feel her systems humming along in their low-power mode, subdued and content, emitting a dim, flickering glow. Widowmaker leans over her and presses a kiss to her lips; she’s turned cold again, and the shock of it jolts Sombra out of her post-coital haze. Conscious of her effect, Widowmaker quickly lifts her body away, but Sombra reaches up and takes her in her arms, rolling them over into the path of the space heater. Sandwiched between two sources of heat, Widow warms quickly. She murmurs something into the hollow of Sombra's shoulder, and Sombra opens her eyes, her vision dark and blurry for just a moment before her VR contacts autofocus it and the low-light filter kicks in. 

“Mm?”

“I said, you have done so much for me," A faint sigh. "I wish I understood it.”

Sombra considers this, resting her chin atop the other’s head. As her conditioning faltered, Widowmaker seemed to be able to sense her own feelings, even act on them, but it was still beyond her how others might act according to their own. Perhaps she could have grasped Tracer’s attachment to the woman she once was, contextualizing it as a desire to regain an ally or neutralize a threat, but Sombra…

It’s partially Sombra’s own fault, for making herself intentionally confusing, always keeping her movements and motivations under wraps, so that someone like Widow didn’t have a hope of comprehending, not even when Sombra thought she was being painfully obvious. Now she wishes she knew how to explain herself in a way Widowmaker could understand, instead of just defaulting to deflecting it, like she always does.

“ _You_ did plenty for _me_ just now,” Sombra says, and reaches with one hand to run her fingers down Widowmaker’s thigh, sliding the tips of her hard-light nails across her navel before disabling them suggestively. She’s relieved when Widowmaker responds to the touch instead of pressing the conversation.

 

 

Sombra turns off the space heater. She doubts Widowmaker will need it, and it’s a fire hazard to leave it running unattended. A moment later, though, she finds herself scrounging around for a blanket, another thing that Widowmaker probably doesn’t need, but it doesn’t seem right to just leave her like that. She finds the one she usually sleeps under, forlornly crumpled beneath her workstation, possibly a casualty of an attempted power-nap. She shakes it out gently and places it over Widowmaker as carefully as she can, well aware that she's risking waking her up. Widowmaker shifts a little in her sleep as the weight of the blanket settles on her, but otherwise doesn’t stir, and Sombra exhales in quiet relief. 

It makes her feel better, having covered her up. The illusion of protection, maybe, or perhaps the sentimental gesture helps to assuage her guilt. It’s not the first time Sombra’s slipped away from a lover come morning, but previously she’d only felt satisfaction and the slight thrill of making her escape. Now, she feels mostly trepidation. She's about to do the opposite of escape. Sombra knew, when she first hit upon her idea, and throughout the several hours she lay awake considering it, that it would have to be accomplished solo, and as quickly and covertly as possible. If she gave it any more time, if she discussed it with Widowmaker, she knew she’d be able to convince herself not to do it. Even lingering like this, turning it over in her mind, and how chancy it was - the walls of the server room seem to close in on her, as though urging her to stay, and Sombra turns away with finality.

Focus. Practical preparations. Getting dressed would be a start. The pink bunny pajamas are clearly out of the question, so Sombra digs through the meager, messy piles on the floor: She doesn’t keep many of her clothes here, she usually wears (and sleeps in) her versatile uniform when on the base. Underwear isn’t too much of the problem. The jeans she finds are cutoffs from last summer, but they’ll have to do. The white shirt that Widowmaker had been wearing. An old jacket that could probably stand to be cleaner. It’s decent enough. Sombra runs her fingers through her messy hair, and, after a moment’s consideration, combs it all to the other side of her head, the side with the damaged implant and small scar. Covering it up. An illusion of protection.

She shakes her systems, booting them from their low-power mode, and they come to life with only a few stuttering complaints. Petulant error messages blink into her VR contacts, and she dismisses them with a flick. Hang in there, baby, just a little longer. There. That’s clothes and tech done. What else? 

Sombra finishes the leftover energy drink, and begins going through the compartments of her workstation as quietly as she can. She finds a slightly crystallized energy-protein packet - breakfast - and, in a sad, forgotten drawer filled with archaic hard copies, a .22 pistol.

It’s one of the cheaper, mostly analog kind that are a dime a dozen among delinquents and n’er-do-wells. Pop-rocks, they used to call them, in Los Muertos.  _Cuetes._ They were meant for mostly for distraction and attention-getting; they weren’t good for much else. With modern advances in nanotechnology and regenerative healing, a direct hit from one of these would barely slow down even the lowliest Talon grunt. Even Widowmaker’s specialized rifle needed to be charged with a tremendous amount of force to be able to kill the average combatant with one shot; Sombra had seen the recoil on it physically push her back several inches. Compared to that, an analog .22 was just a slightly more efficient form of throwing rocks. Sombra slips the gun into her waistband anyway. Better than nothing. 

She glances only briefly in Widowmaker’s direction before leaving.  _ I love you _ , she murmurs, under her breath, so quietly that perhaps she had only thought it to herself. It’s more for her own benefit than Widow’s; to strengthen her resolve for what’s ahead, to remind herself of the _raison d’etre_ , as the sniper might put it. 

  
  


It’s still fairly quiet above deck; Sombra’s internal digital clock estimates it to be early in the morning, about 5 or 6am. A few Talon personnel are going about their business, and if they’re concerned by the subdued notices that the base is currently on lockdown, they’re doing their best not to show it. They leave Sombra alone; a few of the braver ones give her curious or inquiring glances, but all give her a wide berth. As she heads towards the more exclusive, higher security areas, their numbers thin, to be replaced by the accusatory glare of hidden cameras. Sombra pauses to flip one of them off with a cheerfulness she doesn’t quite feel.

As she does, a sudden presence materializes behind her, like a disapproving parent who’d been sitting up waiting for their child to return past curfew. 

“Sombra.”

The hacker turns around, deliberately slowly and insolently. “Rrrrreaper.”

His arms are crossed, his mask a stark scowl. He’s all suited up, too, fully armed, as though about to leave on a mission. Tendrils of unformed smoke still linger around his edges. “I should have known you would take this too far.”

Sombra shrugs, spreads her hands in a gesture of sheepish helplessness. “What can I say? She’s a beautiful woman.”

Reaper takes a step towards her, and Sombra instinctively hops backwards, out of his reach. It’s not that she actually thinks he’s going to attack her, but she’s feeling a little jumpy this morning. Being disarmed and desperate will do that to you. 

“What are you planning, Sombra?”

“Who says I’m planning anything?”

“You wouldn’t have left the server room, otherwise.”

“Maybe I’m just looking for the bathroom.”

“ _ Sombra _ .”

“Fine,” Pushing Reaper to exasperation was usually fun, but right now Sombra’s too impatient, and they’re both too on edge, to keep it up. “I’m off to see the big man.”

“Akande?”

“You know a bigger one?”

Reaper is silent for a long, meaningful moment, which is enough to wear on Sombra’s frayed misgivings. She would rather have just avoided this whole confrontation; just have flicked on her optical camo and run for it the moment Reaper appeared behind her. In her current state, though, her systems can’t handle the cloaking device. But Reaper doesn’t know that; she has to let him believe that she’s parlaying with him because she wants to, not because he has her cornered. 

“I will talk to Akande for you,” he finally says. He reaches out a gauntleted hand, sincere, offering. “I can convince him -”

“That’s sweet,” Sombra cuts him off. “You know I always appreciate your help. But you know what they say about wanting something done right.”

“Sombra,” Reaper growls. His hand is still extended, reaching now, but cautiously, as though towards a skittish animal. “Don’t make this any worse for yourself. I know how you operate.”

Sombra just laughs, a little more nervously than she intended, and skips a few steps backwards down the hallway. The other makes no move to pursue.

“It will be better on all of us,” Reaper continues, “If things returned to how they were.”

“What, and undo all my hard work?” Sombra already knows that that’s exactly his intent. “What about Widowmaker, huh? Will it be better for her?”

To Reaper’s credit, he flinches guiltily. “Once it’s...done with,” he says. “She will not care.”

Moving steadily backwards, Sombra’s put a decent distance between them now, and is starting to feel her confidence coming back. Reaper’s still rooted to the spot. If she ran, he wouldn’t be able to catch her. Not without attacking.

“Yeah, but  _ I’ll _ care,” she calls down to him. “What if I don’t want that for her? What if she doesn’t, either?”

Reaper’s sigh is so long and heavy it seems to magnify throughout the halls, and half dissolve him into smoke. “We can’t always have what we want, Sombra.”

“See, that’s one of the many differences between you and me, Gabe.” Sombra says. “You actually believe that."

He’s gone entirely incorporeal now, just a white mask in a black smudge. The effect is more piteous than intimidating. “Don’t call me Gabe.”

“Fine.  _ Cabron. _ ”

With that, Sombra whips around and breaks into a run, sprinting down towards Akande’s private offices, almost half-expecting a shotgun blast to catch her in the back. But Gabriel wouldn’t do that to her. He’s sentimental, which is to say he’s entirely predictable. 


	10. Chapter 10

The digital lock on Akande’s door has a password that changes every half-hour. Supposedly it’s a random generation, but Sombra’s pretty certain that there’s a way to guess it. There’s nothing truly random within a system, after all, only increasingly complex patterns...of course, this is all pointless speculation for the moment, since the door is unlocked. Akande clearly doesn’t feel the need for an advanced security system to protect his office while he’s in it, and Sombra’s always considered an open door as good as an invitation. She pushes her way in.

His office heaves with a subtle opulence: wide, semi-circular, and bathed in sun from huge windows, which are no doubt programmed to filter the natural light into its most pleasing and unobtrusive state. Akande himself is behind his workstation, its seamless wood paneling concealing the fact that it’s more of a large computer than a traditional desk. A cup of tea steams beside him, kept perpetually warm by a heated saucer. Rooibos chai, Sombra knows, an expensive, loose-leaf blend imported from his hometown in Nigeria.

“Sombra,” Akande greets her, calm and unsurprised, and gestures to a chair in front of his desk, which significantly smaller and less-comfortable looking than his own chair - though that still makes it pretty nice. Sombra takes a seat, and lounges, throwing an irreverent leg over the armrest: If he was going to play this all casual and unaffected, then she would too. Akande folds his hands, his organic fingers sliding between the huge mechanical ones with practiced comfort, and waits.

“Morning, _jefe_ ,” she starts off with.

“Good morning,” he replies dryly. There are some people, Sombra knows, that you can lead around in merry circles before leading them to your point. Akande is not one of these. If you didn’t cut to the chase, he would cut there for you.

“I have a proposition,” she says, tapping her hard-light nail noiselessly on the chair’s armrest as she speaks. “Concerning Widowmaker.”

“Let’s hear it.”

“I want her to not be reconditioned. I want the personality suppression to stop.”

Akande lifts an eyebrow. “Why?”

“It’s unnecessary,” Sombra summons up all her bluffing power, trying to sound as authoritative as possible on something so clearly out of her field. “At this point, it no longer affects her combat ability and mission performance.”

“I didn’t realize you were so concerned with the resource efficiency of Talon’s combat operations.”

Sombra ignores the jibe. “I’ve seen as much, just from observation. And by her own admission. If you lean on Moira, I bet she’ll tell you the same.”

Akande leans back in his chair and regards her, but without disdain; Sombra spies a calm glint of fascination in his eyes and knows she’s in.  
“You are not wrong. Dr. O’Deorian’s reports corroborate your assessment,” he tells her. “However, combat performance is not the only factor we must consider with regard to your friend. The personality suppression program is our most straightforward means of ensuring her loyalty to Talon.”

“Loyalty is...important,” the hacker concedes.

“While we cannot imbue her with any particular love for us, Widowmaker’s ennui drives her to seek purpose, and we provide it accordingly. It is an elegant symbiotic relationship, and there is no reason to disrupt it,” he pauses, and then adds, “You have a personal stake in this.”

It’s not a question.

Sombra shrugs it off, remembering anew what makes Akande so dangerous, gigantic superpowered gauntlet notwithstanding. Reaper, Widowmaker, even Sombra herself create their auras of power by being cold, closed off, unbreachable. Akande is different. He oozes empathy; attacking instead of defending, a sword in his gaze instead of a wall. Empathy does not necessitate compassion, and Akande wields it more brutally than he does the Doomfist gauntlet.

“With all that in mind,” he says, “I’ll ask you again. Why should we cease Widowmaker’s personality suppression?”

Sombra sits up, and leans forward on the desk, spreading her hands apart in a magnanimous gesture. “Because I’ll give something to Talon, in return.”

“And that is?”

“Me.”

There’s a long silence. Then Akande laughs. “Are you threatening to defect from Talon if we recondition Widowmaker?”

“Of course not,” says Sombra impatiently. “You’d only kill me.”

“We would, indeed,” Akande replies, matter-of-factly. He takes a sip of his tea.

“If you cease Widowmaker’s personality suppression,” Sombra hesitates, for just a moment, and takes a slow, steadying breath. “I will come on board Talon as a full agent.”

“Then you have yourself a deal.”

Sombra blinks, a little surprised at the abrupt agreement. “I...want full dental benefits.”

“As an agent of Talon, you will be privy to every right and privilege your position affords,” Akande says, waving a hand. “That will include dental coverage, and your repairs, of course.”

Sombra unconsciously lifts a hand to the damaged side of her head. “I don’t want Moira touching me.” For a moment, she considers demanding that her usual augmenter be brought in, but then decides against it. They wouldn’t thank her for getting them tangled up in Talon. Not in the long run, anyway. “Anyone but her.”

“We have plenty of other doctors and technicians.”

“Good,” Sombra leans back. Now that she’s resigned herself to her fate, the confidence comes more easily. “Let’s do this, then.”

Akande opens a keyboard on his workstation and, with a few clicks, pulls up a contract. It’s the sort of contract that, were it to be printed in an analog fashion, would be dozens of pages long, but on the screen it’s condensed into a single page of QR blocks. Sombra scans them quickly.

“If you need time to read it over - ”

“No,” says Sombra, and presses her right thumb to the screen.

The screen blips and accepts her print: They’re not her originals, which she’d had removed years ago, but designer patterns fashioned to look like her sugar skull logo. Still binding, unfortunately. She wonders if Widowmaker’s fingerprints had been removed, but it didn’t seem likely, seeing as they belonged to a woman who was already legally dead.

Akande presses his own fingerprint to the screen, and in an instant, Sombra feels her above-board access to the Talon network expand exponentially. At the same time, she feels the claws sink in, the monitoring eyes descend, the override programs begin to install. Akande takes another sip of his tea and replaces the cup with a clatter.

“Now that you truly belong to it, let me tell you something about Talon, Sombra,” he says, his voice smooth with satisfaction. “Other organizations, Overwatch for example, might tell you that their teams work like families. Talon is not a family. Talon is a body. And you are now its limb.”

“Do I get to pick which one?”

“It’s only a metaphor, Sombra.”

“I want to be a leg. I’ve always found them the sexiest...”

“My point being,” Akande speaks over her. “Limbs are invaluable. They create the body. They are not to be replaced lightly. But, ultimately, they are replaceable.” The fist of his gauntlet clasps and unclasps, demonstratively. The sword gleams. “Do I make myself clear?”

Sombra wills a firewall up behind her eyes. “Unutterably.”

 

 

Moira O’Deorian considers herself above video calls. She is far too busy, especially right now, to sit down and posture for some camera; doing all those useless little courtesies like maintaining eye contact and nodding when the other speaks. Perhaps others can prostitute themselves like that, but Moira’s time and attention is _valuable_. They can talk to her while she’s working, or not at all.

“Are you going to answer that?”

Moira scowls at the woman sitting atop one of the steel tables, and, unabashed, the other stares back, kicking her dangling legs like a child. She looks like a child, especially in that pink bunny pajama top, which is slightly too small for her and strains beneath her broad shoulders. What had happened to the plain shirt they had given her? Her hair falls over her face in knots and tangles. One day, Moira thinks, she’s going to take a pair of garden shears to that ridiculous mess.

“You had better answer it,” Widowmaker says. “It’s Mr. Ogundimu.”

Moira slams her tablet down on the table, making the contents of a test tube rack slosh around dangerously. Widowmaker doesn’t so much as twitch at the sudden noise.

“When I want your opinion, Amélie, I’ll give it to you,” Moira snaps, but she puts a hand to her earpiece and answers the call. A video blips open on the screen.

“Yes, what is it?” she asks, forcing demure respectfulness into her voice but not turning towards the camera.

She listens to the earpiece for a moment. Then she says, “I beg your pardon?”, and, “Yes, I heard what you said, but I cannot conceive who - ”

Then she looks over at Widowmaker, and sees her sitting up, childish slump gone, suddenly rapt with attention. Moira follows her gaze to the screen and sees Akande sitting calmly at his desk, but it takes a moment before she spies the figure standing next to him. At first she wonders how such a ratty-looking teenager got into Talon, and then she recognizes the tech implants, the violet-tipped hair, the shit-eating grin.

“No,” says Moira instantly.

Widowmaker kicks her legs, a little more forcefully this time.

“No. No, no, no,” Moira stalks over to the video screen and jabs a long nail into the webcam to punctuate her words. On the other side, Sombra cranes her neck, trying to see past her. “This is unacceptable. I am the only Operator in Talon. I answer to no one.”

A moment later, teeth grit, Moira says, “Yes - of course,” and hangs up the call. She looks back at Widowmaker, who returns her stare with wide, innocent eyes, the corner of her mouth just barely beginning to curl.

“What did he say?”

Moira pulls the earpiece out and throws it at her head.

 

 

“I didn’t think I’d get a requisition request from the _jirafa_ so soon,” says Sombra. “Or that she’d insult me for five and a half very eloquent paragraphs before she gets around to asking for…er, a new comm device?” She frowns at the screen. “So, what do you think, should I authorize it?”

Widowmaker shrugs where she is perched on top of the console table. “You have no reason not to.”

“That’s besides the point,” Sombra sighs. “You know, you really have to work on seeing things from multiple angles.”

“I have a visor that does that for me,” comes the careless reply.

The hacker laughs. “I wonder how long you’ll be able to keep up that deadpan humor without your reconditioning.”

“I have no idea what you are referring to.”

But Widowmaker doesn’t smile as she says it; Sombra looks, but sees no telltale smirk. Her tone is icy, in fact. Sombra looks back at her screen, reflecting, not for the first time, that she’s changed the power dynamic between them: To save Widowmaker from the personality suppression, Sombra had demanded the authority to veto the process. She’s already written a program to automatically deny approval when requested, but it doesn’t change the fact that she still has the power to say yes. That, benign or no, she’s become one of Widowmaker’s puppetmasters. But pulling strings is all Sombra is good at. It’s the only way she knows to survive.

“Are you angry with me?”

Widowmaker fidgets. She looks away. “You were clever. You took the best opportunity you had.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

Sombra’s gun and equipment have been returned to her. Widowmaker isn’t permitted hers in between authorized missions. They’ve been unofficially benched for a while, at what Sombra suspects was Reaper’s insistence - she can only imagine the sort of fights currently taking place among upper management.

“You gave your freedom,” says Widowmaker, after a thoughtful silence. “You have put yourself in danger, all for my sake. No, I am not angry with you.”

“I promise, _viuda_ , I - ” Sombra begins, and then stops. All of a sudden, it comes to her.

“What is it?” Widowmaker tilts her head, inquiringly. “Sombra?”

“Olivia,” she says. “Call me Olivia.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's finished! Thank you so, so, much to everyone who's taken the time to read, comment, and promote me. This is the first multi-chapter fanfic I've ever completed, and I've been so grateful for the support.


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